President’s Message

Paul Jester, PLA, ASLA 2022 President

An Unexamined Life … Strategically Planning for the Future

Happy summer! We have made it past the solstice, and I hope everyone is enjoying the cicada-free months this year. Summer is a wonderful time to stay busy with fun projects, professionally and personally. From what I hear, our industry continues to thrive, and I can’t wait to see the wonderful projects that are submitted this year for our annual LCA Excellence in Landscape Awards. As we continue to work, I hope everyone is able to take some time for your own mental health and find ways to relax when you can. I am looking forward to camping and weekend trips with my family. I always enjoy the family time and disconnecting from “the real world” for a few days—it offers a great time to decompress and is an opportunity for self-reflection in my life.

While not always an easy thing to practice or fit into your schedule, self-reflection is the practice of taking time to think about, meditate on, evaluate, and give serious thought into our behaviors, attitudes, motivations, and desires. It is a “deep dive” into our feelings and emotions, trying to discover the “why?” behind them. As Socrates said, “An unexamined life is not worth living.” I believe that this applies not only to us as individuals but also to companies and organizations.

Over the last two years, the LCA board has been conducting a selfreflection of the organization, trying to define who we are and what we offer to our members. We know the last two years have been challenging for everyone, and we have felt these impacts as well. The board has taken time to make a few internal changes and evaluate the association and what we offer to our members. We recently changed our executive director, who helps guide us and makes our goals a reality. I want to thank our previous executive director, Thérèse Clemens, for all she has done for the organization, and we welcome Matt Coffindaffer into the role.

In addition to bringing in a new executive director to help guide us, the board worked these last few months to revisit and refresh our strategic plan. The strategic planning process offers the board members an opportunity to define our goals and objectives, creating a vision for the future of the organization. Our previous plan was due for an update, and we took this opportunity to evaluate and refresh our strategic initiatives and how we plan to implement them. It was interesting to review the previous plan and reflect on what has been achieved.

This reflection and restructuring of priorities will set us up for longterm success for our members and create amazing opportunities for them within the industry! We are always working to offer high-quality resources and sponsor the best events we can. Please keep an eye out for new in-person events related to our industry, including educational and social events, leadership and volunteer opportunities, and chances to share our work with like-minded professionals. We are excited to share the new plan with you soon. I know we can achieve amazing things together. As always, thanks for your support of LCA. This is a fantastic community that I am proud to be a part of!

Respectfully,

Paul Jester, PLA, ASLA LCA President 2022